>[captioning made possible by democracy now!] >> from pacifica, this is "democracy now!" >> to me, stories worth telling or what were but the truth. >> and speaking of true regime change, where women rise to take their place en masse at the helm of earth's frail and failing ship. >> music and that still the backbone, wind in the sails of social justice movement. >> i guess paul robeson said it best.

[indiscernible] >> i believe and our social presence, as breaker of official silence is, as a voice for those whose voices are disregarded, and as a human birthright. >> culture and resistance, 2012 through voices of artists, musicians, poets and writers. we look at the nexus of politics and art, airing highlights of our cultural coverage of the past year. featuring alice walker, walter mosley, randy weston, steve earle, randall robinson, and others. and we pay tribute to the late adrienne rich, whitney houston, and mark the centennial the birth of woody guthrie. all of that and more coming up. this is "democracy now!," democracynow.org, the war and peace report. i'm amy goodman.

today, and a "democracy now!" special, looking back at 2012. we look at art, culture, and resistance. we begin with rattle robinson, founder and past president of transafrica, a law professor at pennsylvania state university, most recent book "makada" said at the dawn of the civil rights era following a young man coming of age in segregated richmond, virginia. through his blind grandmother and her visions, he discovers her his race and africa. he came to our studios on the eve of dr. king's birthday to talk about his new novel. he lives now in st. kitts. >> when i was a child growing up in richmond, virginia, we were called negros. no one i knew we were called that. no one knew the province of that word. it had no connection to what we might have been before we were

blocked from review by that lethal, opaque space of slavery. so we did not know anything about ourselves except we had been called this, but not by ourselves. it turns out is much like the case of the sardine. there is no such thing as a sardine as a fish living free in the ocean. it only becomes one when it is captured and put in a pan. and we were only called negros when we were leveled during slavery as that, as a way of severing us from any memory of what we had been. so we lost our mothers, our fathers, our families, our religions, our languages, our cultures, our memories of what we had been. and so we thought we had no history before slavery. and this man, this new name,

this new label helped to facilitate that loss of memory. memory is the active agent of all collective social progress. if you cannot remember yourself, your suffering from serious debilitation. this novel is the story of an extraordinary woman who is a poor, blind waitress in richmond, virginia, who remembers past lives. and so she remembers timbuktu in the late 1300's, when her father was a priest who underwent cataract surgery at the university of timbuktu. she remembers her days in ancient egypt, when the to the chips were united thousands of years before. she remembers lives in west africa. she remembers all of this and she tells it to her grandson who

wants to be a writer. they have a special relationship. she swears in the secrecy that he tell no one that she has these memories were people think she is a bit fruity, as she says. but she remembers these lives in extraordinary detail. and he is inspired by it. he gained his confidence from it. and this is, of course, to symbolize the enormous consequence. sometimes we think of slavery, we calculate the economic consequence of the. but we have not calculated the psychosocial consequence of it, unless we factor in the loss of memory, which was occasioned by deliberate and systematic program imposed from those -- by those who controlled us.

>> this young man you write about, gray, your protagonist, doesn't expect much of his older brother, outside of anything conventional. and yet when they're walking down the street one day in richmond, virginia, at the time of the first lunch counter sit ins, it's his older brother who says, let's do it. and grey says, do what? and he says, let's go sit down at that lunch counter. and he is the one who drags his little brother in. talk about the affect of the civil rights movement on segregated richmond, your home town, too. >> my brother max and i lived not terribly far from the capital. it was unguarded in those days, and on sundays we to go down and bang on the door and run like hell. were we to go down to the white house of the confederacy and throw rocks at it and run home, feeling better about what we had done.

we had struck some kind of blow. i remember when i was at norfolk state college in 1959, 1960, 1961, went down to lunch counter downtown. and our parents had said, don't do that. my aunt and uncle, with my state, "don't get involved." but everybody wanted it to work, but nobody wanted us to get involved. i went down and did that. i thought i grew a little in that day, at least an inch or two, because my back straight and. and that's what gray and his brother were doing down at the gc murphy counter on broad street in richmond, virginia. >> and in this book, a great grows as well. at one point, he's never quite sure early on how his grandmother has these vivid memories. but he goes to west africa.

he discovers particular descriptions of her the or positively accurate. >> she tells him the story when he's 15, that her father sat her down, the priest. he used to have counseling sessions with his children at least once a week. and he told her about the mysteries of the interplanetary system and the sirius star system, the pattern of the rotation, the revolutions, the weight of the sirius star, the weight of emme ya, the weight of po tolo, another rotating body around sirius. how did the dogon people in the ancient mali in the 1300's know

all of this? it has been documented that they did. she told this to her grandson and had him draw a map based on her recall of what her father had described to her, and he kept this all these years. and then when western scientists finally identified some of these bodies her grandmother had told him about, he was agog that she was right. she had been there. she had seen it. the truth is only in the 1990's did french astronomers finally identify the tiny star of women, the dogon people call it, emme ya, finally sought with the western telescope. they have known it for more than 1000 years. it's an incredible story.

>> we are broadcasting from park city, utah, home of the sundance film festival. over the weekend here, we spoke with robert redford, the founder of sundance, an academy award winning director, renowned actor, producer, activist. i asked him all his great commercial success in hollywood, how was it that independent film has become his passion. >> stories that are worth telling more the truth beneath the truth your given. or you think you know. i think like "all the president's men," what is the story? what is the truth about two guys doing that others were not doing that managed to take down a top figure in government? how did that work? it was about hard work. so for me, i started to get really obsessed with -- what is a personal story? what is the story that made so much money? i just went along with it. i was a young student in new york rid i watched that game

show and i thought, wow. there's something wrong. the guy winning all of this, everyone is going all over themselves about this guy. i don't know i believe in. i never doubted the whole system was corrupt. and never doubted the whole system was rigged. i thought, that is another example, what is the truth? i think that is what has driven me. >> the only thing that feels right is to begin with a prayer for a woman who we loved, for our fallen sister whitney houston. [applause] heavenly father, we thank you for sharing our sister with us. today, our thoughts are with her mother, her daughter, and all of her loved ones. and although she is gone too soon, we remain truly blessed to have been touched by her

beautiful spirit and a half her lasting legacy of music to cherish and share for ever, amen. >> whitney houston is the latest cultural icon to pass away during this year's black history month. february 1, don cornelius was found dead at his home in los angeles in what appeared to be a suicide. he brought black music and culture into america's living rooms through his dance show "soul train," one of the longest-running syndicated shows in television history and put a critical role in spreading the music of black america to the world. the grammy award winning are increasing at a james died at the age of 73 from complications of leukemia. >> ♪ at last, my love has come along oh, yeah

my lonely days, they are over and life is like a song ♪ >> she is recorded as having bridged the gap between rhythm and youblues and rock and roll. neither etta james nor don cornelius were included in the grammy awards ceremony, although she was honored at the salmon breed for more, we're joined by marc anthony nail in madison, wisconsin, prof. of black popular culture in the african-american studies at duke university and also hosts a

weekly webcast and has a blog. welcome. can you talk about the significance of the death of whitney houston? >> thank you for having me on. she is part of a generation of what i call black pop crossover artists that would include eddie murphy, michael jackson, and even michael jordan. and that they had been president amount of access to the american mainstream. we've never seen that level o before. in terms of the kind of access of a woman like whitney houston had to the american mainstream, her success was really unprecedented. you go back and look at her lineage. included in her family is the great aretha franklin who redefined so music.

also, dionne warwick, who had a crossover pop style. what use in the 1980's is the coming together of different streams of black pop music from the 1960's. she perfected it. she found the perfect pitch for what was really pop music. i think in some ways, we do and in justice to whitney houston to even think of her as an r&b singer. she transcended it even in the 1980's. she was america's pop princess, and definitely black america's pop princess. we see the success of what she did -- of course there was a price she paid for this level of brlebrity. we see it also with the late michael jackson. ll coolj, coming out of rap, someone would be hosting the grammy awards 25 years later, is simply amazing. it is a testament to the level of success that someone like when houston had as a crossover

artist in the 1980's. >> "democracy now!" this! back in a moment. ♪ [music break]

>> we're joined by dave isay, the founder of storycorps. talk about this project to have been doing. >> you describe it very well. it is this mass of oral history project. we have done 40,000 interview with everyday people across the country.

>> it is not you doing the interviews. >> no, everyday people come to the boot to gather and that i facilitator they think of themselves as bearing witness to these interviews. many people think of it as, if i had 40 minutes left tto live, what would i say? two cd's r berndt, one does with you and the other goes to the library of congress. >> one of the couples who was so inspired you through the years, i have been to our various events as you launch your books and storycorps are danny and annie. i think a lot of people have followed them over time. i want to play this clip. if he could start off by saying what you have done. for our radio audience, they will hear these two wondrous voices. before the tv audience, we have

taken another step. >> we started animating the storycorps stories about two years ago. one of these facilitators, who's one of these people who gathers the wisdom of humanity, came into my office one day and said, i am a facilitator but also an animator. by brother is as well. we started animating storycorps stories. and then i tried to toss him out of my office. before i can get him out, he slammed a dvd into my computer and this wondrous thing showed up. storycorps animation was born. i am a radio purist. you have known me since i started in radio many years ago. what these young men had done was to add a layer of magic to the magic that happens just between the two people and the voices. we're also doing a big push into schools. i think of this as a gateway drug to get kids to engage with the video and then listen to the audio. >> i always feel guilty when i say i love you.

i say is so often. i say it reminds you that -- it is lecturing a beautiful song from a busted old radio. it is nice for you to keep the radio around the house. >> if i don't have a note on the kitchen table, i think there's something wrong. >> dealing think i could think of it is wrong is i cannot find a silicon >> to my princess, the weather is raining. i will call you at 11:20 in the morning. i love thee, above the, i love you. >> when a guy is happily married, no matter what happens the rest of the day, there is a shelter when you get home, and knowledge knowing you can help someone. being married is like having a colored television set. you never want to go back to black and white. >> this is the animation. it says they spent 27 happy years together. january 2006, dan was diagnosed

with pancreatic cancer. a few setter, the recorded one last interview together from their living room in their home in brooklyn. >> the illness is not hard on me, it is just the finality of it. he goes along like a trooper. >> listen, even downhill a car does not rule unless it is pushed many of given me a great push. the deal of it is, we try to give each other hope, not hope that i will live, hope they will do well after i passed, hope that other people would support her, or that she needs some unlike some in recent him. >> he has everything planned. >> i am working on it. she said it was her call, that she wants to walk out [indiscernible] -- walked up behind the casket alone. i guess that is the way to do it. you know when you are married,

your father takes you down. rear brothers take you down. she did not want to offend anybody. i said, he walked in with me, he walked out with me. the other day i said, who is going to walk down the aisle with you behind the casket? to support her. and she said, nobody. i walked in with you alone, i will walk out with you alone. wheres a thing in life you have to come to terms with dying. i have not come to terms with dying that. i want to come to terms with being sure you understand that my love for you up to this point was as much here as it could be and as much as it could be for eternity. i always said the only thing i have to give you is a poor gift and its myself. and i always gave it. and if there's a way to come back and give it, all do that, too.

t have the valentine's day letter there? >> yes. "my dearest wife, this is a very special day. it is a day of which we share our love, which still grows after all these years. now that love is being used by us to sustain us through these hard times. all my love, all my days, and more. happy valentine's day." >> the legendary pianist and composer. for the past six decades, his been a pioneering jazz musician, incorporating the vast rhythmic here to of africa. langston hughes once wrote "when randy weston plays, combination of strength and toughness, virility and velvet emerges from the keys and in bed and flow of sense seemingly as natural as the waves of the sea. >> langston hughes, talk about meeting him. and how he inspired and what you did together. >> so many ways.

again, marshall stearns. >> a white professor, western mass. >> he brought the langston hughes up. we made an automatic connection. i was not a professional pianist. i was not a professional musician. to make a long story short, he knew my interest in africa and african culture. as it turns out in 1961, their very first summit of african americans going to africa was in nigeria. and langston was part of that movement. and then later on with a great melba, i asked langston if he would write a freedom poem for me. the african country was just getting independence in 17 african countries got their independence in 1960. i wanted to create a work of music, this freedom of africa.

langston wrote a freedom of home for me and also wrote the words to song i call "african lady, a close third dedicated to our mothers, sisters, the african women who were always in the background, who always support us. and finally -- >> can you play a little? which one? "african lady"? sure. ♪

>> you mentioned the freedom poland. do you remember it? >> what we did was this. as a boy, i was always upset in movies. the image of african people in hollywood prevalent. hart is putting it mildly. i was upset with african languages, what they would call african language. i wanted to put it and african language, the poem. i went to langston and the freedom poem -- which means freedom.

>> with a great congo flows. it contained swahili. i went to the united nations and talk to a number of diplomats at that time. i said, how can i use one african language when there are so many languages in africa? how can i choose one? the general consensus was, you swahili. so i had this guy who was a scholar of swahili. he took langston's poem from english to keep swahili. his diction and voice was so wonderful. you can see him on the recording. >> africa where the great congo flows africa, where the whole jungle knows a new dawning breaks

africa a young nation awaits, africa' >> [indiscernible] then when you got to be good aircraft, he had to make a contribution to society. >> i'm joined by the award winning author walter mosley who has published 37 books, the written many others, including a series of bestselling mysteries featuring the private investigator, detectable in a blue dress" that was made into a film starring then sell washington. his last known for his nonfiction work that addresses the pressing political issues of

our time. >> there is an article from 2006 called walter mosley and about black power. it says most have been democrats for the 53 years of an ally, what the democrats that resin that time? with the lowest average income of any group in the nation, incarcerated an enormous the still segregated and profiled. >> that was the beginning of a long arc of thought for me. at that time i was saying, we just have a black party. it all these black people to gather and tell whoever is running for office what we want. vote.y, we get ththe later on, as i worked on it, i kept thinking, the problem with america is its inaccurate interpretation of democracy.

when we say, will you vote? and then things happen for it later on a wrote a book i've not published called "making democracy in america," in which to get people to vote blind committing to say, vote for what is good for you, never for things you think you don't like. and -- if he could get people to do that, everybody thinks the same thing. everybody in america wants a living wage, wants to retire comfortably, one's education for their children. if you voted for only the things that are important to you, we would all go together. that is what democracy is about. it is not whether i like you are agree with your lifestyle or not, it is what is important for me in my life. i've been trying to work out a way to create a blind democracy, completely ignoring basically the --

>> you recently wrote for cnn colorado "food stamp president." i want to play a clip from the january republican debate when fox is moderator questioned newt gingrich about his food stamp comments. >> you refer to president obama as the food stamp president. it sounds as if you are seeking to the little people. [boos] >> first of all, juan, the fact is, more people up and put on food stamps by barack obama than any president in american history. [applause] heineman the politically correct or not supposed to use facts that are uncomfortable. >> that was newt gingrich being questioned by fox news juan williams at a presidential debate. walter mosley, your response? >> this interesting, at a struggle with cnn a little bit

because i had written about the poetry of the statement. food stamp president is billion. it is like a whole book of things in three words. he applies them, so he's not releasing it. when you watch the clip, it is the same thing. he says, "well, jun," and he stops. i am talking to some of the of color print the way he does it is so -- he is a master at that. i wanted to talk about how bad is the kind of the all-i wanted to talk about how that is the kind of useless, a brilliant american politics. we're talking about things that don't matter. what matters is, people being able to afford their own lives, people being able to say whether or not they think the rich should be taxed. what matters is -- what really

the issue is in american politics, and so brilliant and getting around that -- and newt was so brilliant in getting around that. i am so amazed by ingrid i'm not bothered or even frightened of him read what i am frightened of is people who don't understand your own system. i spoke at a fundraiser for obama back before he got elected. and the only thing i said was, "look, we're working hard now to get him elected. we have to work twice as hard after he gets elected to make sure what we voted for actually happens." >> i walked there picking mushrooms at the edge of dread, but don't be fooled. this is not a russian column, this is not somewhere else but here. our country moving closer to its own truth and dread, its own ways of making people disappear.

i won't tell you where the place is, the dark mash of the woods meeting the unmarked strip of light. ghostwritten crossroads, leaf mold paradise i know already who wants to buy it, sell it, make it disappear. and i won't tell you where it is, so why do i tell you anything? because you still listen because in times like these, to have to listen at all, it is necessary to talk about trees. [applause] >> that was adrienne rich, reading her poetry. she died on tuesday the age of 82. alice walker, your thoughts about adrian? >> the thing i most loved was her integrity. she lived exactly what she said,

and this was so rare and so beautiful, and we will miss her. >> can you talk about the national book award in 1973 that she won for diving into the wreck, that she insisted that you, alice, and audrey lord, accept the award with her on stage? where were you? >> i was in mississippi. i was fighting the good fight down there. but anyway, what happened was, we were all three nominated for this award. we understood we relieving under apartheid. and segregation and all of that. and that under such a system, which favored white people, she would get the award. we knew that. we decided before anybody, before anything was announced, we would not accept being right. we would not accept the racism

implicit in in a war that would go to someone. she was a great poet, but it would go to her also because she was a white person. and to her immense credit, she had no desire to be honored as we would be dishonored. so we got together, audrey called in mississippi and we chatted about it and adrienne, so we decided we could only accept an award so suspicious -- so auspicious if we accepted it in the name of all women and indicate by that action that we understood that women were not honored in the arts and elsewhere. >> why write for children? >> i don't write for children. >> you don't? >> ii write. >> do you like them?

what i like them as to and far between as i do adults. maybe a bit more because i really do not like adults at all. >> that was a late worst of colbert.ephen >> we were joking with him in the hospital -- it was dotted gingrich wasn he said in india. >> the children of the world grows up. >> that segment was unbelievably positive. maurice had the ability to speak universally. he really was a genius. which is a term i do not use often or lightly. one of the things i felt --

maurice died on tuesday morning around 3:00. i was very sad that he was not alive to hear that. he was somewhat grumpy about marriage in general. he really loved obama -- obama read his book "where the wild things are" and still reads to kids in the rose garden, and that meant a lot to him. he has a little plastic obama doll on his table. there's a photograph somewhere of him pertaining to eat the obama doll because oral a corporation is one of the highest tributes -- i will eat you up, i love thee so -- that maurice could give anyone. i think he would have been tremendously pleased and moved. he was a wonderful, wonderful friend. immensely delightful person to spend time with.

i think just a very -- as people have been saying, without question, the greatest figure in children's literature in this century and a very great artist, i think, a very significant american artist. >> on sunday, protesters marched from grant park to near the nato summit among those there was musician and activist tom barlow. >> i was asked to perform today from iraq and and afghanistan veterans. >> what about these soldiers who are about to return their medals? i know it is not easy for many of them or their families. >> i think there is nothing more courageous than taste soldier who stands up against an unjust war. that is what they're doing. courageous soldiers. >> and the role of music and art in resistance? >> what music can do is help steel the backbone in the midst

of a struggle, put wind in the cells of social justice movement. i have been here the last three days playing songs for a variety of causes, but none more important than today. >> this is "democracy now!," democracynow.org, the war and peace report. i'm amy goodman. back in a moment. ♪ [music break]

>> singing woody guthrie's song, live at a concert organized here in chicago in marking his centennial, also marking the protest at the nato summit. blanketse from her with a gun in each hand said come all of you cowboys fight for your land ♪ >> a rare 1945 video recording of woody guthrie known as the dustbowl troubadour. he became a major influence on countless musicians including bob dylan, bruce springsteen, pete seeger and phil ochs. well he is best known as musician, he had a deep political side. at the height of the mccarthy

era, woody guthrie spoke out for labor and civil-rights and against fascism. >> steve earle, could you talk about the significance of woody guthrie in your life? >> 1969, of 14 years old, the vietnam war is going on. i am not a candidate for student deferment rid of my friends started getting drafted. i started out playing at coffeehouses because i was not old enough to play in places that serve liquor. the one coffeehouse in san antonio, texas was a pretty politicized environment. you know, these people quoted woody guthrie chapter and verse. the local underground newspaper was published upstairs. i never separated music and politics, what kept bringing me back to woody over and over. and finally went to nashville when i was 19. i was trying to make a living playing music. i still don't consider myself to be a political artist. i am just an artist, like woody

was -- that lives in politically charged times. when i started playing, the war was going on. and now, i think these songs become, i think, more relevant every second in the times we're living in right now. >> his importance in terms of merging politics and music on his guitar? he had this machine kills fascists? >> and several guitars, including some that did not belong to him. sometimes it is written on the surface of the guitar. there several signs he made it or put on guitars. there's a whole thing like -- i'm a guitar collector and spent a lot of time trying to track down the history of various guitars woody guthrie was photographed with. there are five or six he was photographed with. i know one, he is a photograph over and over with but it was

not his. t was will geer's wife's guitar the board for a very long time. a lot of it has to do is just to woody was and how woody was. i think he make decisions -- you couldn't make a different decision and make more money, but i think there's. say, ok, i've got this audience and i'm going to keep this audience and i'm going to be a look at myself and the mayor if they're certain lines that i draw for myself as a go along and identify who i am as an artist that i don't cross. that can change. it is not necessarily a static thing. times change. what is important changes. i think many -- he was not doing this for money. he was doing it because it happened. it became who he was as a performer, as organically i think as anyone can come up with a career plan.

it sort of happened. a lot of it who he was, who he was born as. i think most of it as artists, is to become as whatever the world presents to us that we travel through, the paths we travel. >> our next break, steve, is your choice. >> i think the one -- i don't think that any doubt about that for this. ♪ at 2012 looking back through culture and resistance. if you're like a copy of today's show, go to democracynow.org. back in a moment. ♪ [music break]

>> i am a poet. i am not here because there's been an overwhelming year in which we all realize we have to do something and is become an opportunity to the whole occupy movement to stand up and say the conditions in this country in the world are impossible. and so weakened standing gather as a group for one. as a poet, i'm taking the opportunity both for myself to actually not read poems today and not write poems today, and kind of resist poetically, which i take seriously, but it happens

-- as it happens, i teach a class at columbia called avant garde poetry. we looked to see how we could take part in may day. occupied organized a may day education date which people doing similar things to us met and talked about the possibilities of resistance in education and new ways of dealing with education as a people. what is interesting, we can to the different groups and nine are totally like us or for us. i had encouraged everybody to bring a poem. we decided to do the human microphone and share poetry with everybody. it is kind of amazing. people are just jumping up and taking part. people are reciting poems they know by heart, people who are doing -- who know rap are doing

that. it is incredible. the one thing humans do that does make us different from animals is we have language. i think poetry, weirdly, is like the first language and the last one. i think when language was invented, it was poetry before it was anything else. it was religious shaking and chanting. i think it is deeply embedded even in our genes. poetry for the last 20 or 30 years has soared and regarded as -- not seen as a media on its own. if we think of the 1950's, 1960's, 1970's with the liberation movements, it was allen ginsberg and judy garland and other standing in front of the crowd and reciting poems.

poets were always sort of the human statue, giving voice to a lot of needs. >> or vidal has died at the age of 86. he was one of the best known chroniclers of american history and politics. he dedicated his work to writing and critiquing the injustices of u.s. society. in a 2004 appearance on "democracy now!" he talked about the role of democracy in the u.s. dating back to the constitution. >> the word democracy is not only never mentioned in the constitution, but was something the founding fathers had seen. it is not generally known because it should not be known. i wrote a little book about it called inventing a nation that was published last year at yale. our founders feared two things, one was the role of the people, which they thought would just be a mass, and they feared tyranny, which had gone through king george ii. -- king george iii.

the wanted a safe place, a proper place for white men to do business in. here we are, of bringing democracy to the poor afghans, but only real democracy is in the prisons, which we specialize in everywhere. and which a more interesting thing that came out of all of that mess was now the world knows how we treat americans in american prisons. all of that behavior, the humiliation and violence and so on, that is typical of the federal prisons somewhat, but state prisons, municipal prisons, detention centers, this is a nation of torture. and those who disagree with me,

you can write an angry letter at this very moment, if you can write at all, sit down and write an angry letter to the commander in chief. >> we're joined here in washington by alice walker, the pulitzer prize-winning author, this year, the third anniversary of her momentous work "the color purple skin and you have written a poem in this election year. would you share it? >> it is dedicated to -- to resolve to bring it back to help by planting trees. as you know, she died last year. rest and well done, sister of our plan. democratic womanism, he asked me why i smile when you tell me you intend in the coming national election to hold your nose and

vote for the lesser of two evils. there are still more than two evils out there, is one reason i smile. another is that our old buddy the st. thomas comes to mind with his fearful 400-year old prophecy. that our world and theirs, too, our enemies, kids included there, will end by nuclear nakba holocaust in our lifetime. which makes the idea of elections and the billions of dollars wasted on them somewhat fatuous. a southerner of color, my people held a vote very dear while others for centuries merely appeared to play with it. one thing i can assure you of is this i will never betray such pure hearts by voting for evil, even

if it were microscopic, which, as you can see in any newscast, the matter the slant, it is i want something else from a different system entirely won it not seen on this earth for thousands of years if ever. democratic womanism. notice how this word has "man" right in the middle of it. that is one reason i like it. he is right there front and center. but he is surrounded. i want to vote and work for a way of life that honors the feminine, a way that acknowledges the death of the wisdom, female and dark mother leadership might have provided our spaceship all along i am not thinking of a talking

head kind of gal, happy to be mixing it up with the baddest bad boys on the planet. her eyes a slit, her mouth a zipper. no, i am speaking of true regime change, where women rise to take their place en masse at the helm of earth's frail and failing ship. or each thousand years of our silence is examined with regret and the cruel manner in which our values of compassion and kindness have been ridiculed and suppressed, brought to bear on the disaster of the present time. the past must be examined closely, i believe, before we can leave it there. i am thinking of democratic and perhaps socialist womanism, for who else knows so deeply how to share but mothers and

grandmothers, big sisters and aunts. to love and adore both female and male not to mention, those in between to work in keeping the entire community fed, educated, and safe democratic womanism democratic socialist womanism, would have as its icons such fierce warriors for good as vandana shiva aung san suu kyi, wangari maathai . tubman, yoko ono, frida kahlo angela davis and barley with new ones always rising wherever you looke. you're also on this list, but it is so long isis would appear midway that i'm stop or be

unable to finish the poem. so just know i've stood you in a circle that includes marian wright edelman, amy goodman, sojourner truth, gloria steinem and mary mcleod beithune, john brown, frederick douglass, john lennon and howard zinn are there. happy to be surrounded. there is no system, no system now in place that can change the disastrous course ce earth is on. who can doubt this? the male leaders of earth appear to have abandoned their very senses, though most appear to live now entirely in their heads. they murder humans and other animals forests and rivers and mountains every day they are in office and never seem to notice it. they eat and drink devastation.

women of the world. women of the world, is this devastation us? would we kill whole continents for oil or anything else rather than limit the number of consumer offspring we produce and learn how to make our own fire? democratic womanism. democratic socialist womanism. a system of governance we can dream and imagine and build together. one that recognizes at least 6000 years of brutally enforced complicity in the assassination of mother earth, but foresees 6000 years ahead of us when we will not submit. what will we need? a hundred years. at least to plan. 500 will be handed us gladly

when the planet is scared enough, in which circles of women meet, organize ourselves and, allied with men brave enough to stand with women, men brave enough to stand with women, nurture our planet to a degree of health. and without apology -- impossible to make a bigger mess than has been made already -- devote ourselves, heedless of opposition, to tirelessly serving and resuscitating our mother ship and with gratitude for her care of us worship fully commit to rehabilitating. >> could to prize-winning author alice walker. we spoke on the 30th anniversary of the publication of her but "the color purple." that does it for our year in a special. democracy now! is looking for feedback from people who appreciate the closed captioning. e-mail your comments to outreach@democracynow.org or mail them to democracy now! p.o. box 693 new york, new york 10013.

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